Eugene Coste builds a 270-km (168-mi.) long pipeline, one of the longest and largest pipelines at that time, to carry Bow Island gas to Calgary and Lethbridge.

Natural gas wet with condensate is first discovered in the Cretaceous level at Turner Valley with the Dingman No. 1 well by Calgary Petroleum Products, the company originally founded by William Stewart Herron.

The Canadian federal government transfers control of natural gas and other natural resources to the provincial Government of Alberta through the Natural Resources Transfer Acts of 1930.

In December 1929, Mackenzie King signs natural resources transfer agreement prior to the passage of legislation in 1930. Source: Provincial Archives of Alberta, A10924

Oil and Gas Resources Conservation Act becomes law, and the Petroleum and Natural Gas Conservation Board, now the Energy Utilities Board, is formed as the regulatory authority for all gas and oil operations.

An Act for the Conservation of the Oil and Gas Resources of the Province of Alberta Source: The Oil and Gas Conservation Act, SA 1938, c. 15

The largest gas reservoir in Canada at the time of discovery, the Jumping Pound field becomes a symbol of the need to resolve the stalemate over whether or not Alberta should export its natural gas; without adequate markets, it remains shut in until 1951.

Efforts to promote natural gas as a safe, clean alternative to coal help the market expand rapidly, and large-scale processing and pipeline projects are constructed to serve the growing market.

But of course! Gas The Modern Fuel! In the years following World War II, the development and use of natural gas skyrockets due, in part, to rigorous marketing. Source: City of Edmonton Archives, EA-275-1776

In 1952, facilities in both Turner Valley and Jumping Pound begin to convert the toxic hydrogen sulfide in sour gas into benign elemental sulfur, and by the 1970s Canada becomes the largest exporter of sulfur in the world.

The Lodgepole sour gas blowout smells up the air for weeks, highlighting a growing conflict between the desire for economic development and the need to safeguard the public.

As conventional sources of natural gas have matured and declined, the industry has increasingly focused its efforts on developing unconventional gas resources such as shale gas, tight gas and coal bed methane.

Jumping Pound

At the time it was discovered, the natural gas field at Jumping Pound, 30 km (19 mi.) west of Calgary, near Cochrane, Alberta, was the largest gas reservoir in Canada. That is not, however, all that made the Jumping Pound site significant. This gas field, deep in the Rocky Mountain foothills, was also the first to be discovered as a result of seismic mapping and the first to undertake sulfur reclamation as a way to sweeten its hazardous sour gas.

Exploration in this area had been initiated by independent oilman R.A. Brown—the same Brown who had struck oil in Turner Valley in 1936 with Royalties No. 1. After several fruitless years of exploration, Brown sold his rights to Shell Oil in 1942. Shell then began drilling and, just before Christmas of 1944, hit gas that emerged wet and sour from the then-deepest well in Canada.

Despite the apparent size of the Jumping Pound reservoir, Shell found it necessary to put its development on hold; the market remained limited due to war-related issues as well as to Alberta’s refusal to export its natural gas. Once the processing necessary to transform the wet, sour gas into a marketable product seemed feasible, Shell signed a contract with Canadian Western Natural Gas (now ATCO) agreeing to build the processing plant while Canadian Western would construct a pipeline to connect to the Calgary market. The processing plant began operation in 1951 and quickly gained the reputation of being Canada’s experimental sour gas lab as much of the understanding of sour gas came from practical application there.

The improved understanding of sour gas was gained through the many inventive solutions plant operators had to develop for the difficulties that plagued Jumping Pound from the outset. As always, in Alberta, the weather figured prominently among these challenges. Designed by a California company accustomed to a more temperate southern climate, the plant lacked enclosed buildings. The hazards of such an open plan were revealed by the freak blizzard that swept across southern Alberta in June 1951, two months after the plant began operations. Employees scrambled to thaw pipes, hoses and even boilers. The following winter was equally ferocious, with frigid temperatures contributing to numerous interruptions in plant operations. Fortunately, plant employees

rose to the many challenges they faced, developing approaches for dealing with high pressure sour gas that have since become standard practice.

The summer after the facility initially began operations, the sulfur plant was completed, making it the first sulfur plant in Canada. Using the modified Claus process, Jumping Pound produced 32 tonnes (35 tons) of elemental sulfur a day, a by-product essential to the West Coast’s pulp and paper industries. Shell Canada continues to own and operate the Jumping Pound complex, which has expanded considerably since 1944. Three additional gas fields have been discovered and plant capacity now permits efficient recovery of ethane, butane and propane in addition to sulfur.